Read Flowers Stained With Moonlight Online
Authors: Catherine Shaw
She puts on her dress reluctantly, but her impatience drives her. Sylvia takes her to a hairdresser’s shop on a little side street. Without undue shame, Camilla explains what she wants.
‘Short like a man, and a chignon made from the cuttings.’
‘
Oui
, madame.’ Used to every absurd folly, no questions asked. He washes the hair, combs it out, cuts quickly and surely. Sylvia is sitting nearby, watching. The long locks fall to the ground; Camilla thought she would feel some regret, but instead feels only lighter and freer as the thick short waves lift and come to life, unencumbered by the weight that always pulled them down. The switch will be ready only the next day. Camilla returns home timidly, wearing a large hat.
‘I can’t go to the dining room like this,’ she says, removing it in front of the mirror, ruffling the hair, staring at herself, entranced, amazed.
‘Silly,’ says Sylvia, handing her the trousers.
And now it is true. Camilla is transformed; Camilla, in fact, is gone.
‘Gone to the library!’ smirks Sylvia insanely.
A young man stares back at her, takes her arm.
‘We’re going out,’ he says, his voice quiet and low. And together, excited, tense, fearful and adventurous, they brave the streets.
Nothing happens. No one notices anything. And that, in itself, is the most exciting and extraordinary thing of all. Camilla increases in bravery; she stops staring at the ground, stands tall, strides long, laughs.
‘We’re going to have supper in a restaurant,’ she says. And they do.
When they return to the hotel, she is inflamed as never before.
They go out together every evening.
After a
verre d’absinthe,
they begin to invent wild plans.
‘Let’s elope and live together on a Greek island,’ whispers Camilla. ‘Let’s go to a church and get married. Let’s hunt antelope together in the savannah.’
But Sylvia, as usual, dazzles her with the infinitely higher
degree of daring contained in her perfectly feasible, down-to-earth projects. After all, she is the one who said
Dress like a man.
And now she says,
‘Let’s go to a party together.’
‘A party? What party?’
‘We’re invited to the Hardwicks’ this evening. Let’s go there.’
‘Sylvia!
Camilla
is invited there with you – there are people we know! It’ll never work.’
After another absinthe, they decide to go. Camilla will speak only French, and introduce herself as a Russian prince.
‘This is mad,’ she says. She is terrified. Sylvia is crazy with laughing.
‘When I do something silly, this is what I always say to myself,’ she gasps, ‘what is the worst thing that can possibly happen?’
‘“Camilla, what
do
you mean by that ridiculous get-up?”’ says Camilla, mimicking being recognised instantly by their high-nosed hostess.
‘“Dear Eleanor, Sylvia has been behaving most peculiarly,”’ chokes Sylvia, mimicking a letter being addressed to her
mother by a well-meaning blue-haired busybody. They are laughing so much they can hardly breathe.
But when they arrive at the party, after the first minute of sheer terror, Camilla realises that nobody recognises her; it is not so surprising, after all. She has only encountered their hostess once before, and that briefly. She stops wanting to burst into nervous laughter and begins to live her part; to live her life, she thinks. Camilla is a part.
‘Where is Camilla?’
The words break on her ear like a wave, she looks up, startled. But Mrs Hardwick is addressing Sylvia.
‘She couldn’t come, I’m so sorry,’ Sylvia is saying with impressive self-composure. ‘She – she had to go to the library!’ Camilla loves her madly. Her face burns as she hooks her arm over Sylvia’s and draws her away.
She adopts her role so completely that she feels Slavic to the soul. ‘This is my friend, Vassily Semionovich, Prince Yousoupoff,’ says Sylvia inanely to a bunch of old ladies who fan themselves, fluttering, and Camilla becomes the Russian prince, advances a leg and swings her arm over the back of a chair in a pose of casual mastery.
Oh, the moment of exquisite panic and beauty when Mrs Hardwick suddenly takes it into her stupid head to
introduce the Russian prince to a Russian diplomat! Within five seconds, he has grasped that the impostor in front of him is no Russian at all –
but the real imposition in front of his very eyes – of that, he sees nothing!
Flooded, blinded by euphoria, Camilla recounts a ridiculous tale of a joke and binds him to the secret – and he merely laughs, and promises.
‘Do you mind, sometimes,’ Sylvia asks her later, ‘that you do after all need to disguise? Does it mar your pleasure in being able to behave openly?’
‘No!’ answers Camilla, so sharply she surprises herself. ‘This is the openness that I wanted. This is it; I have it. I don’t need the other Camilla, the one in the dress. She can disappear, she can—’
‘—go to the library!’ finishes Sylvia with a giggle.
Marie-Antoinette had it built for her entertainment; a frivolous, artificial but ravishingly beautiful plaything. Sylvia and Camilla walk through it, through the little dilapidated buildings: stable, dairy, farmhouse. Their thatched rooves are half eaten away and their yellowish colour is dirty, yet it is easy to see how dainty they must have been when they were fresh and new. A toy for a princess.
‘It cost a fortune to have it all built,’ said Camilla. ‘Even the
lake is artificial. And look at the little houses around it; she had a whole tiny toy village built next to her farm.’
Enormous branches of wisteria twine around the half-collapsed balconies, covered in light green leaves; the flowers are gone already. A pigeon-house, a bee-garden, a vegetable patch. Camilla can only shake her head in disbelief. It is the tangible sign of a cosmic effort to play at life.
‘What does it mean to play at life?’ wonders Sylvia, unconvinced.
‘To engage yourself in something … but not deeply. Not for real. Just for fun, or for show.’
‘Like me marrying,’ she says then. ‘Perhaps I meant to play at it.’
‘You did,’ says Camilla.
‘But George didn’t,’ she answers. Camilla whirls, turns on her.
‘Sylvia – have you – has he—’
‘No,’ she says, a little wrinkle of worry appearing between her eyes, belying her unconcerned voice. ‘Camilla, you know I never will. I don’t want to, and anyway, I couldn’t. I should go mad. But then, I am destined to go mad anyway, I suppose. In fact, I am already mad.’
‘Nonsense, Sylvia, what are you saying? Sylvia – if it’s becoming very bad, you should leave him!’
‘Oh, Camilla, I can’t leave him any more. I didn’t want to tell you. He’s got a certificate from a doctor friend of his, that says I’m quite mad. Really he does. He made him write it because he did the doctor a favour. He told me if I make him, he’ll use it to have me locked up in a madhouse.’
Camilla stares at her in blank shock.
‘Sylvia, how can you bear to go on with it?’
‘Oh, he won’t really do it, I suppose,’ says Sylvia, smoothing out her forehead with her fingers. ‘At least I hope not. Anyway, I’m here now.’
She has a magic ability, which Camilla totally lacks, to remain carefree under such a menace, as long as she is momentarily far away from it. But Camilla is cramped with terror. Sylvia twines her arms around her neck with kisses.
‘Perhaps I’ll never go back,’ she says. ‘Let’s just stay here forever.’
Reality has no power over her.
‘We know too many people in Paris. Let’s leave.’
Camilla has slipped so entirely into the skin of a young man that the feel of the lace ruffle on her fingers confuses her when she buttons her blouse, and the swish of the long skirt swinging around her legs feels awkward, like a disguise, like an obstacle. She puts them on, hating it, when they must visit Sylvia’s friends.
‘Your clothes are so lovely, Camilla – it’s almost a pity!’
‘I never want to see them again. I’ll still make things for you.’
And they leave Paris altogether and take a train up to Deauville, and live in the night altogether; dancing, gambling, walking on the waterfront wrapped in greatcoats, kissing on the beach under the winking stars, sleeping until the afternoon. Moonlight is their time – moonlight is the time for secrets. Deauville is their place – a nocturnal town where phantom people dripping with phantom diamonds fling phantom money, laughing, to the winds.
When they run out, Sylvia says they must return to Paris and wire.
‘You wire your father for money, and I’ll wire George and say we’re staying on here. I wonder what he’ll say,’ she suggests.
‘Perhaps he’ll come and get me, and lock me up in a madhouse after all.’ She laughs, half-bitterly, half-lightly. And Camilla spends another night of agony, trying to pierce the blackness out of the window, trying to pierce the blackness of the future, while Sylvia lies in bed, her naked limbs abandoned in sleep, and incomprehensibly, perfectly tranquil.
The manuscript broke off suddenly at this point. My candle had grown small as I read, and now, as I remained still and trembling, it guttered and went out. I sat in the dark, clutching the bundle of papers, pictures whirling in my brain, unable to think or act. A long time passed, I believe, before I finally rose and tried to feel my way quietly, in the pitch darkness, back to my room. It was only a few feet away, but objects were littered about the place, and I soon knocked something over – it fell with a crash and I gasped into the darkness.
A match scraped nearby and I heard the sound of a bolt, and simultaneously, saw a line of light form underneath the door leading into Sylvia’s room. It opened, and she stood in the doorway, framed in the square of light. She stared at me, and it seemed to me that on her face, in her wide eyes, was imprinted a strange look of horror that I had never seen there before. Her eyes fell upon the papers in my hand, and she raised them in a quick glance to the top of the closet, then to my face.
‘So you know,’ she said quietly.
‘Yes. I know now. Did you know?’ I answered. I spoke low, but could not whisper, for it was too ghostly in that dark room, shivering with spirits of the dead.
‘Only today, when Mother’s wire came. She only wrote that you had come back, and wanted to see me. I thought it quite ordinary, but Camilla panicked. I didn’t understand at first, when she said you must have realised everything. She said you were looking for George’s murderer, she knew it. She said that that lady in Paris, Mrs Clemming, had written to Mother while you were over there. Camilla saw the letter arrive, though Mother never mentioned it. I thought that stupid lady just wanted to scold Mother for my bad behaviour in Paris, but Camilla was sure that it was because you were investigating over there. She was so upset this morning, when the wire came. I couldn’t understand it.
Don’t you see? She knows. She knows it was me,
she said. I stared at her. It took me a long time to understand.
You’d better leave. Go back home,
she said.
I’ll write to you.
So I left. It seemed like such a long way back. I arrived after you had gone up, so I went to bed, but I couldn’t sleep. Then I heard something fall in here, and knew it was you.’ She paused for a moment.
‘I feel numb,’ she continued. ‘I don’t seem to be able to feel anything. Camilla is gone. She’s gone forever, I think. Maybe to Russia, maybe to Africa. And I can’t feel what she did, I can’t feel that she’s gone. I feel dead.’
‘It’s shock,’ I said gently, going to her.
‘People thought it was for the money!’ she said, with a strange giggle. ‘The money – George’s money! What’ll happen to it now? I don’t want it – I’ll never touch it, even if they give it to me, after all. Oh, it isn’t mine – if I had my way, I’d – I’d make it all over to Ellen’s little boy.’ She was speaking a little feverishly, her eyes strange, her breath
short. ‘If only – if only there was some way they could prove he was really George’s son.’
‘I think it could be proven,’ I said softly, remembering the photograph. I approached her, worried about the echo of madness in her voice, and held out the manuscript, I don’t know why. But she pushed my hand away.
‘Oh no, not that!’ she cried. ‘I don’t want it, I never want to see it again! Oh God, I’m afraid of it – it means death … yet it means love. It’s too beautiful to destroy.’ She paused, and added softly, ‘Do you think Camilla will write to me? I don’t know what I’ll do if she does. Burn the letter, maybe. Or follow her to the ends of the earth. I don’t know. I don’t know.’
She reached out a finger and lightly touched the manuscript I held, then turned away and returned to her room, silently.
The dawn was just beginning to flush the sky with pink streaks. I closed my door behind me and tried to lie down upon my bed, but I could not rest at all; it seemed to hold a secret horror for me. I rose and dressed instead, packed my small bag, thrusting Camilla’s manuscript deep into it amongst my things, and now I am writing to you until it should be late enough for Peter to be about his work. Oh, Dora, I cannot face Mrs Bryce-Fortescue and tell her these things – I cannot! I mean to slip away to Cambridge as soon as I can get Peter to take me to the station. I need to go home, I need to see Arthur. I shall write or telegraph from there – but only God knows what I shall say …
Your desperately upset
Vanessa
My dearest sister,
All is over; I am here, and safe. I am worn out with it all. Only this morning, awakening with the sun, I suddenly remembered that the fresh breeze blowing the curtains and the shrill birdsong outside signified, perhaps, the beginning of a new chapter in my life.
Yesterday after I finished writing to you, I picked up my bag and went out to the stable. I thought it might still be too early, but I found Peter there already, employed in waxing saddles.
‘Peter, I need you to take me to the station,’ I said miserably.
‘So you’re leaving,’ he said tonelessly, putting down his work.
‘Yes, I am leaving,’ I said. He stood up, and began the complex work of leading out the horses and hitching them up without speaking or looking at me.
‘Oh, Peter,’ I said, climbing up on the box beside him, ‘I do feel terrible that I never told you I was engaged. It was awful of me. I am so sorry. Please forgive me. But I never thought you would care at all – I thought it was all just …’
I stopped, for why should I add another lie to all the harm I had already done? I had seen well enough that he was growing fond of me.
‘It doesn’t matter, Miss Vanessa,’ he said with a ghostly smile. ‘It was all just … That’s all it was. All I want now is to get away from this place and this family and start off afresh.’
‘That is all I want, as well,’ I said with heartfelt sincerity.
He glanced up at me in quick surprise, but said nothing until we reached the little country station in the nearest village. Only then, as he reached my bag down and helped me alight, did he speak again, but then it was with a kinder expression in his eyes.
‘Goodbye, then,’ he said with the hint of a smile. ‘Folks like you and me will always fall on their feet, I think. So it’s all right. Good luck!’ He turned away abruptly, and heaving a sigh of mingled guilt and relief, I stepped onto the quay, sat down upon a sunny and dilapidated wooden bench, and waited for the first train of the day.
It took me far too long to reach home; changing trains, and waiting, alone, on platforms in tiny stations overgrown with vines, in villages with enchanting names. It was afternoon already when I reached Mrs Fitzwilliam’s house. I rushed upstairs at once, and knocked on Arthur’s door, terrified that he would not be in. But he opened it at once, took one look at me and collected me in his arms.
‘Oh, Arthur,’ I cried. ‘You didn’t want me to shake hands with a murderer …’
It took me a long time to steel myself to tell Arthur everything; much longer, in fact, than it took for the actual telling. He listened, white, and wanted to rush to the police at once.
‘Wait just a moment,’ I said. ‘There is something I must show you.’
Not sure I was doing the right thing, not sure what to do at all, I slowly dug Camilla’s manuscript out from among my tumbled things and handed it to him. He read
through it attentively; it took him some time. After he finished it, he put it down upon the table and remained silent for a while; when he spoke, it was to quote the words of Rosalind.
‘Were it not better
Because that I am more than common tall,
That I did suit me all points like a man?
A gallant curtle-axe upon my thigh,
A boar spear in my hand; and – in my heart
Lie there what hidden woman’s fear there will –
We’ll have a swashing and a martial outside,
As many other mannish cowards have
That do outface it with their semblances.’
He paused, and then, taking my hand, he said, ‘I think we must go to the p-p-p-; to the police. Now.’
I hesitated; it felt wrong and yet I felt it must be inexorably the only thing to do. I was afraid of Camilla’s being arrested and also afraid that she would be long gone. Above all, I felt that I no longer had any will at all in the matter. Dora, I felt quite simply too tired, bone-tired. I followed Arthur wordlessly outside.
We were proceeding down the path to the gate when it swung open vigorously, and Pat O’Sullivan walked up towards us with his springiest step.
‘So you’re back!’ he exclaimed eagerly, rushing towards me. ‘Well? Have you found everything out?’ He stopped short, taking in the expression on our faces.
‘What is it?’ he said. ‘You two look about as cheerful as gravestones. Is it something to do with the murder? What’s going on?’
I turned to Arthur, unable to answer. But he was not looking at me nor even at Pat; he was looking down the path to the gate. A young boy was standing in front of it, studying it. He put his hand out and pushed it open, but remained peering in hesitantly.
‘What are you looking for?’ Arthur called out to him.
He consulted something white he held in his hand.
‘Does Miss Vanessa Duncan live here?’ he enquired.
‘I am she,’ I said, leaving go of Arthur’s hand and hastening down the path.
‘Letter for you, miss,’ he said, giving it to me. ‘Hand delivery. Lady gave it to me yesterday afternoon to be delivered after twenty-four hours, she said.’
Half consciously, I saw Arthur thanking the boy and handing him a bit of coin. I knew who the letter was from before I tore open the envelope which bore my name. I extracted the sheets it contained, and read them; leaning over my shoulder, Pat and Arthur read them too.
Dear Vanessa,
You will most surely not wish to receive a letter from such a person as I am, and for this reason I will remain brief, considering myself lucky enough if you will only consent to open it.
Your sudden appearance, your subsequent trip to Paris, the anxiety of Sylvia’s mother – all these things
finally caused me to understand your true purpose among us, and that for my own safety, as worthless and unjustified as that may be now that I belong to the abhorred portion of humanity which shares the brand of Cain, I am better far away.
Yet I cringe at the idea that any blame for anything that has happened should fall on any head but my own, and for this reason, I have written a confession, after a great deal of reflection on how to best achieve my purpose. It is addressed directly to the police; I humbly beg that you will transmit it to them without delay.
Yours sincerely,
Camilla Wright
The letter to the police was written on a loose sheet of paper; I pulled it out and read it over, Pat breathing heavily in my ear.
To the British Police,
I the undersigned, Camilla Wright, hereby admit and confess to the murder of Mr George Burton Granger of Haverhill Manor, Haverhill.
I shot Mr Granger because he betrayed me. Unsatisfied by his wife, he turned to me for solace and declared that his passion for me was such that he had never felt anything like it, that his marriage was an error, that he would have it annulled and that we would be married as soon as possible. Although Mrs Granger was one of my closest friends, I naturally kept this affair entirely secret from her.
Recently, by a strange coincidence, I discovered that Mr Granger had had a mistress by whom he had a son. I taxed him with it, and during the scene that ensued, he changed completely; he told me that he had had and continued to have many mistresses, that I was merely one of them and had never been anything more to him than a passing whim; that far from annulling his marriage, he now intended to consummate it and ensure himself of a legitimate heir.
In the early afternoon of the fifth of June of this year 1892, I shot Mr Granger in the chest with my own personal weapon, purchased in France several months earlier. In order to avoid detection, I travelled up to Dover and crossed over to Calais, then came back from there disguised as a man with a red cape, hoping to be noticed and remembered by a number of people; it was an easy matter to remove my disguise on the train back to London. I hoped to escape suspicion entirely, but I see now that what I have done is bringing undeserved fear and accusation to innocent people. I write my confession for this reason: I, and I alone, am responsible for Mr Granger’s death.
Dona nobis pacem.
Camilla Wright
I had barely had time to take in what I was reading before Pat was off, setting the bell on the gate a-jangle as he swung through.
‘Police won’t see the press before tomorrow morning at the earliest,’ he called back over his shoulder. ‘Maybe I can make the evening paper with this! Yes!’
‘Oh, Arthur, how awful,’ I murmured, hiding my face against his coat. ‘I shouldn’t have let him see it.’
‘Murder is awful,’ he answered. ‘It doesn’t matter, Vanessa. Pat can’t make any difference now. Camilla left yesterday morning, didn’t she? She must be halfway across Europe by this time. Whether they find her or not is a matter of chance at this point; it doesn’t depend on what Pat does, or even on what we do. For the moment at least, she seems to have escaped by a narrow margin.’
‘Maybe too narrow,’ I answered, turning resolutely towards the gate.